I smiled and kept quiet. I
connected their conversation with the old Martha/Mary division and the
differences between people. Some people are do-ers, workers, those who
accomplish great—or not-so-great—things for the kingdom. They “work for the
night is coming,” knowing that “their labors are not in vain.” Others prefer to
sit at the feet of the Master, meditate, pray and just be. They focus on “abiding
in the vine.”

This division is, of course,
superficial. Most of us move back and forth on a continuum between doing stuff
and quietly being present. While we may tend to one side, we’re both types, depending
on circumstance and opportunity.

I’m a poet. The noun “poem” comes
from the Greek “poema,” and its verb form means, ironically, “to do” or “to
make.” The particular making that a poet engages in results, sometimes, in a work of art.
Work is on the doing-stuff side, but art leans toward the livers of the world.
The combination, “work of art,” brings them together in synchronicity.

This is beginning to sound as
silly as my grandkids’ conversation.

At any rate, I’ve added a new
meaning to an old word. I’ve got lots of stuff to do today, but I will take the
time to remember that I’m basically just a liver.

Saturday, August 1, 2015

Let me begin with a true
confession. I am a member of the board of elders of Northwest Yearly Meeting.
Just a week ago we “released” West Hills Friends Church to follow the way they’ve
discerned that God has been leading them, in acknowledgement that NWYM can’t tolerate
this level of diversity, at this point in time, without breaking apart.

I am also a blogger and, as such,
enjoy being a member of the wider community of Friends. But this month (I’m writing
on the last day of July) is the first in which I have not been able to write a
single blog or, more seriously, a single poem. The agony preceding, in the
midst of, and following our decision has drained the words. Before yearly
meeting, I found that the only way I could pray was, “Lord, have mercy.” And in
the first four days following the announcement, all I could pray was, “I’m so
sorry.” Over and over and over.

I want to acknowledge the other
voices, the voices of care and compassion that have reached out to West Hills
Friends. And to me. Many people from my own congregation, North Valley Friends,
divided on the issues of human sexuality, have approached me with concern and
love, even while they are agonizing over the decision.

I especially want to acknowledge
the attitude of WHF. Throughout the two-year process we’ve recently gone
through, and during and after yearly meeting, believers from this congregation
have been so gracious and respectful. That continues, in spite of the grief and
pain. I’ve had emails from individuals at WHF this week, asking if I’m alright,
expressing concern and encouraging me. One said, “Yes! Of course we’re still
friends!”

Soon after the decision was
released, I was invited to a meeting of young adults of NWYM, those who were
especially concerned (read, “outraged,” or “anguished”) by the decision. They
included many members of my congregation, extended family members, and young
people who were MKs when I served as a missionary in Bolivia. They also included
several members of WHF. Most of these came up to hug me at the close of the
meeting.

Back to West Hills, I think that
if I were still in my idealistic little girl stage of life, I would look to
these sisters and brothers and think to myself, “That’s how I want to be when I
grow up.”

I also want to acknowledge my
fellow and sister members of the board of elders. We went into yearly meeting
week mindful of the differing perspectives we represented, matching the whole
gamut of positions in the wider yearly meeting. But throughout the week we
managed to proceed with love and respect for each other. And we did indeed come
to a new place. We found we could not find fault with WHF for not “being in
compliance” with a section of Faith & Practice that the yearly meeting
no longer holds in consensus. We realized that we had a deeper level of
theological discernment ahead of us. And we also sensed the pain of the whole
yearly meeting, coming from both sides of the issue, and our sense of the
possible results of any decision. We came to the language of “releasing” WHF
out of our growing respect for the way these brothers and sisters were moving
forward, our desire for their spiritual prosperity and our hope for a future
reconnection. Individual members of the board grieved our decision for
different reasons, but we all grieved.

I realize that what I write here may meet with
cynicism. I’ll take it as it comes and probably keep silent. (That’s a
prediction, not a promise.) I do find hope in the movement of young adults and
others to appeal the elders’ decision. This brings more people into the
discernment process and perhaps will lead to a better way forward, although
getting there will continue to be hard.

While I’m more inclined to short
blogs, and this one has already leaped the bounds of that ideal, I want to
reflect on a section of Scripture that is guiding me as I reflect on the deeper
issues of human sexuality. Some time ago I ran across several parallel passages
in the book of Isaiah that amazed and delighted me. I love biblical
contradictions that in time tell me I’ve gotten their name wrong. Not
“contradiction” they insist. Our name is “paradox.” So, here it is.

In Isaiah 46:9, the word of the
Lord comes through the prophet to tell the people of Israel, “Remember the
former things, those of long ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God,
and there is none like me.” The passage goes on. And in many other places
throughout the Scriptures, God encourages us to value the old ways, the holy
traditions and understandings that have been faithfully handed down to us, as
we also remember God’s loving acts toward God’s people in the past.

Here’s the parallel passage, a few
chapters distant, but coming from the same historical context. Hear the word of
the Lord, through the prophet Isaiah: “Forget the former things; do not dwell
on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not
perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wilderness”
(43:18-19).

So which is it? Are we facing the
threat of straying from the ancient path of God, giving in to ungodly pressures
from our surrounding context? (This often has happened in the history of the
Christian church.) Or is the Spirit of God showing us something new, something
that includes new light on the meanings behind the Scriptures? (This often has
happened in the history of the Christian church.)

I find myself right-smacky-dab (as
my Grandma would have phrased it) in the middle. I hear truth from both sides.
I did get a word from the Lord recently that I feel is sound and real. I asked
God to show me which way was true (remember or forget?), and I sensed the Spirit
saying, “I’m not going to tell you as an individual; I will reveal this mystery
to the gathered body.” But I have no sense of how long this revelation with
take. I’m sure God can speak faster than the speed of light, but we’re not
always so quick at hearing.

I do have the advantage of my
personality type. I’m a poet. I love mystery and am highly tolerant of
ambiguity. I can wait my way through pain. But not without the hope of an
answer. One of my pastors reminded me this week of a quote by Rainer Maria Rilke
(already underlined in my own copy of his book), writing to a “young poet”:

“…I would like to beg you, dear Sir, as well as I can, to
have patience with everything that is unsolved in your heart and to try to
cherish the questions themselves, like closed rooms and like books written in a
very strange tongue. Do not search now for the answers which cannot be given
you because you could not live them. It is a matter of living everything. Live
the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, one
distant day live right into the answer.”

The only part of that I find issue with is the injunction
not to search now. We don’t dare stop searching. Only God can help us live the
answers.

In the meantime, I would encourage
all of us to drop the language of “villains” and “victims.” We can turn the
“meantime” into a kinder time by the way we treat each other and talk about
each other.

Here are some prayer requests for
the larger body of Quakers, ways to hold NWYM in the light:

--Pray for the LGBTQ people in our
midst, as others have pleaded, that they can understand they are not being
rejected once again.

--Pray for a way for us to stay
together and do the hard word of discernment required of us.

--Pray that we can, even now,
reach out with compassion and be Friends of Jesus right where we are—and anywhere
else in the world God sends us.